Oh Nooo! and I don´t know!!

Submitted by wanderkarm on Sun, 06/15/2008 at 12:26am.

We all know the feeling... you make your move with the unpleasant sensation something is not quite right. You look again and you realise you just lost your queen! It happened to Karpov so don´t feel that bad, as you can see in move 29 of this game.

However that´s not even close to the worst thing that can happen to you in chess. It´s much worse when you actually don´t know what when wrong and you still lost. In fact one of the best ways to improve your game is to replay the games you´ve lost and work out which was your first mistake. You might think this is great advice coming from someone that looses more games than he wins but needless to say I don´t follow my own advice that well.

So lets start with one of the many games I´ve lost, there are many mistakes but which was the first one?

Do you have any games you just don´t know when you lost the plot? Getting someone or even yourself to analyse the whole game is both tedious and difficult, but if you just try to find your first mistake with every game you loose you might take longer to make it next time.

» posted in For Beginners

| 1159 reads | 9 comments |

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Comments:

by ipoo - 15 months ago
Medan Indonesia

Member Since: Oct 2010
Member Points: 117

Maybe polgar & karpov play in a blindfold chess....

by caput - 2 years ago
managua Nicaragua

Member Since: Dec 2008
Member Points: 24

i think that 18. g5 is the begining of the infortunative events for black's army

by figrock - 3 years ago
United States

Member Since: Jul 2008
Member Points: 1438

Polgar is a great chess player..!

by plane129 - 3 years ago
ca United States

Member Since: Aug 2008
Member Points: 432

good advice

by nysguys - 3 years ago
Chico, Ca. United States

Member Since: Mar 2008
Member Points: 16

excellent advice..and encouraging that even a great chess player can make such a huge blunder...the problem is weighing your time..playing chess..fun!!!...vs studying chess...not as fun

by Wrenn - 3 years ago
Massachusetts United States

Member Since: Jun 2008
Member Points: 40

This is good advice, and advice I have now heard a lot looking through these beginner articles. Maybe I will start following it at some point :)

by wanderkarm - 3 years ago
Jinotega Nicaragua

Member Since: Apr 2008
Member Points: 169

Yep in2sport I also feel 18...g5 was one of my first.

by Waldemar - 3 years ago
Amsterdam Netherlands

Member Since: Jun 2008
Member Points: 175

Hi Wanderkarm,

Have you ever tried to first find your last mistake? I would recommend that and then work your way backwards! This has the advantage of looking at all the mistakes in your game and tells you a lot about the objective possibilities that you chose to create with earlier moves. Also it helps you to develop a feel for the margin of risk and error and therefore your fighting possibilities. And last but not least it helps you to decide the critical mistake or actual losing move.

by in2sport - 3 years ago
Melbourne Australia

Member Since: Jun 2008
Member Points: 5

I'm a bit of a beginner, but I thought you were looking pretty sound until you go drawn out of your castle which exposed your king.? Seemed to me that 18..g5, chasing out the white knight was unnecessary, and 19..h5 missed the double threat on the black knight. I thought maybe 18..Ne5 might have been better, enticing a trade with the white bishop on c3, which you could take with your queen and claim the diagonal to a1, potentially forcing a 2-1 trade of rooks plus check???

I assume you have an answer to this?

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